Brick-and-tile skylights and rooflights for the semis and bungalows of Crofton
14.3 road miles south-east of Leeds city centre
Skylight installation in Crofton for twentieth-century brick semis and bungalows under tile, and for the flat-roofed extensions added behind them.
Crofton rooms that sit between two walls and no window
A house built in a compact block, then extended, leaves some rooms with their daylight cut off by the rooms around them.
Bungalow hallA bungalow hallway runs between bedrooms and has a front door as its only source of light.
Long back kitchenA kitchen widened into the garden gets sun at the doors and none at the old house wall.
Box roomA small room over the front door has one narrow window and a ceiling that closes in.
Rooflights that suit Crofton's tile and felt
A pitched tile roof and a flat felt roof each take a different kind of unit and a different detail at the edge.
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Sun Tunnels
A sun tunnel runs through the loft of a bungalow to the hall ceiling, where no wall is free for a window.
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Flat Roof Rooflights
A flat rooflight on a kerb lights a rear kitchen or a converted garage, and the covering is turned up to meet its edge.
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Roof Windows
A roof window over a box room or a landing takes light from the tile slope above and opens for air.
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Misted Rooflight Replacement
A rooflight with fog between the panes has lost its seal, so the sealed glass, or the rooflight outright, is swapped for new.
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Electric & Opening Rooflights
A switch or remote opens a rooflight where the ceiling is beyond the reach of any pole.
What Crofton owners ask when the walls will not do the job
Each answer begins with a roof that Crofton owners actually have over their heads.
How does a sun tunnel bring daylight into a bungalow hallway?
In a bungalow the hallway is the room that nobody notices until a door is shut. Bedrooms and the bathroom open off it, the front door is at one end, and a wall window has nowhere to go. Skylight installation in Crofton for a bungalow hall therefore tends to mean a sun tunnel, since the loft sits right overhead.
The dome goes into the tile slope above the hall. A mirrored tube crosses the loft, and a diffuser panel in the ceiling spreads the light across the passage. The drop is short, so a rigid tube can run straight, and over a given run a rigid tube is the more efficient of the two.
Passing through the loft
The tube has to thread between the roof timbers on its way to the ceiling, and a standard diameter fits the gap between a pair of rafters. The loft insulation is laid back around it. A larger tube may need a rafter or joist cut, and that makes the job structural work.
The dome on a tile slope
The dome stands in a collar shaped to your tile profile, so rain runs round it onto the tiles below. The tiles are lifted and relaid by hand, and the roof is left as it was apart from the small round collar.
What the hallway gets
A sun tunnel suits a hallway, a landing or an internal bathroom. In a bungalow it also brightens the doorways that open off the hall, because the diffuser throws light along the ceiling as well as down the walls.
Choosing the spot on the slope
The dome goes where the tube can drop straight onto the middle of the hall ceiling. We mark that point from inside the loft, then carry it up to the slope with a plumb line, so the dome sits over the diffuser and the tube does not need a bend. A bend costs light, so a straight run is worth a little care over the position.
When a roof window is the better choice
Where the hall is wide, or runs to a bedroom door at the end, a small roof window gives a larger patch of light and can open for air. A tunnel stays the neater answer for a narrow passage, because the diffuser takes only a small round hole in the ceiling.
The written quote names the hall, the unit and its size. A diffuser can be square or round, and a flat ceiling finish is chosen at the same time.
Sun tunnel parts, in brief
- Dome
- The clear cap on the roof that gathers daylight.
- Tube
- The mirrored shaft that carries the light down through the loft.
- Diffuser
- The panel in the ceiling that spreads the light around the room.
- Flashing
- The collar that sheds rain from the dome back onto the tiles.
Our flat-roofed garage is now a playroom. Can a rooflight go into the roof?
A garage turned into a playroom or an office keeps the roof it started with, which may be flat and has no ceiling lined for light. The room may have one window at the front and nothing to the sides, because the neighbouring wall stands close. A rooflight puts the daylight where the walls cannot.
The covering may be felt, rubber (EPDM) or GRP fibreglass, and the upstand and weathering are detailed for whichever is on the roof. Opening up the roof deck is structural work, so the joists are trimmed around it and the kerb is built on top. (We handle the Building Control notification.)
Building the kerb
The kerb is a low timber box fixed around the opening and insulated on the inside. The covering is turned up its outer face and sealed under the rooflight frame, which keeps water from running behind it. On an old roof the existing covering is cut back so that the join can be made on sound material.
Fixed or opening
A playroom does not always need an opening unit, but a room with a closed door and a houseful of toys gets warm. A rooflight that opens by a switch or remote gives air from above, and some models close themselves in a shower through a rain sensor.
Glass for a flat roof
A rooflight on a flat roof takes the Part L figure of 2.2 W/m²K. Warm-edge spacers, a second or third pane and low-emissivity coatings all bring the figure down. A unit with a solar-control coating keeps a south-facing roof from baking the room by afternoon.
Falls and water on the old roof
A flat roof is laid with a slight fall to its gutter, and a kerb built across that fall can hold water behind it. The kerb is set so that water runs round it, and the covering is laid to drain past the upstand. On a garage roof that has sagged slightly, the decking is checked before the kerb goes on.
Inside the room
The ceiling is opened up to the line of the kerb and a light well is built down to it. Plaster goes on the reveal and the finish follows the quote; the dust sheets come off once the room has been cleaned.
If the garage is a separate building, its roof is looked at separately. For an attached garage under the main roof, the pitched tiles above it are looked at as well.
The roof deck and what covers it
How the joists run, what condition the covering is in and where the old falls carry rain to the gutter.
Do we need permission from Wakefield Council to put a rooflight in a semi-detached house?
Crofton has streets of semi-detached houses with hipped or gabled roofs, and each slope has a different face on the street. Planning applications in Crofton go to Wakefield Council, and the first thing to settle is whether your house has the permitted development right at all. A flat or maisonette falls outside Class C, and permission for it is the council's to give.
For a house the conditions limit how far the unit stands out from the slope, how high it sits and how a side-facing one is glazed. Every condition, and each case that takes the right away, is listed in the skylight planning and Building Regulations guide.
A hipped roof and its side slopes
On a hipped semi the side slope faces the neighbour's drive. A rooflight there counts as side-facing, so the glass is obscure and fixed or non-opening below the 1.7m line. A rear slope avoids the question, and it is usually the one that lights the landing or back bedroom anyway.
Replacing a unit already in the roof
Replacing a rooflight in its existing opening is a smaller change than cutting a new one. Even so, we check the house first, since a listed building needs consent whatever the general rule says.
Why the council matters less than the roof
For a semi the question is usually settled by looking at the house and the slope. What is left is the fitting, which depends on the tile profile, the rafter spacing and where the stairs sit beneath.
Obscure glass on a side slope
The 1.7m line is measured up from the floor of the room. On a side slope the glass is obscure, and any part that opens must sit above that line, so a roof window set low on a side slope is ordered as a fixed, obscure-glazed unit.
Landing and rear bedroom
In a semi the landing is often the darkest part, with the bedroom doors closed on either side. A roof window set in the rear slope above it lights the stair from the top, and the same unit can open for air in warm weather.
The same approach suits the rear bedroom, where a roof window set low in the slope gives a bed room to stand under it. Centre-pivot suits that bed, and a top-hung unit suits a room where you step up to the glass.
Crofton and the nearest towns on the map
We work in Crofton, Normanton, Featherstone, Havercroft, Fitzwilliam and Wakefield itself, and in the villages between. A message on WhatsApp to 07880 284133 reaches us.
More about Crofton roofs and rooflights
Why has the rooflight in our kitchen extension steamed up inside?
Cloud between the panes shows that the unit's edge seal has given way, so damp air has entered a gap that is out of reach from both faces. The remedy is fresh sealed glazing, or a whole new rooflight, and either goes onto the existing kerb.
Can a rooflight be fitted without moving out?
A household can stay in the house while a rooflight goes in. The room below is sheeted and the area is cleaned at the end of each day, and the work on the roof is covered quickly so that rain cannot reach the opening.
Which side of a semi should the roof window go on?
The side that gives the room its light with the fewest complications is usually the rear slope. It faces the garden, avoids the street and carries no side-facing glass, so the planning position stays simple.
Will a sun tunnel work in a bungalow with a deep loft?
A deep loft means a longer tube, and the tube is then straightened and kept rigid where possible. Light still travels well down a straight reflective run, though a very long one gives less at the diffuser than a short one. Where the loft is deep, a roof window in the nearest slope is the alternative we weigh it against.
How do you keep the tiles watertight where a sun tunnel dome comes through?
The dome is seated in a collar cut to the tile profile on your roof, with the tiles above lapped over its top edge. Water that comes down the slope meets the collar, runs round it and goes back onto the tiles below.
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